Abstract:

The role of osmosis and diffusion is not an easy concept for students to understand. In addition to basic knowledge, many misconceptions need to be clarify. This research attempts to start from the perspective of student question-generation (SGQ), with a e-learning system to explore whether this method can promote students' understanding of osmosis and diffusion. The literature of SGQ pointed out that through the strategies of SGQ, students could organize and link information and experience more interestedly, and achieved higher cognitive abilities. In order to make students more involved in the process of SGQ, the researchers developed an e-Learning system. Students can use this system to generate questions more flexibly on the concept of osmosis and diffusion. This study adopted a one-group pretest-posttest design, recruited a total of 21 college students from Taiwan, and conducted experimental interventions for a total of six weeks of teaching. First week, introduce the preliminary functions; second week, conduct the analysis of the concept of osmosis and diffusion and introduce the advanced functions; third week, carry out the script planning of the questions; fourth and fifth weeks, conduct in-depth discussions and technical guidance with students; sixth week, students conducted self-study, and each group revised their own work. In terms of assessment, the Osmosis and Diffusion Conceptual Assessment (ODCA) developed by Fisher et al. was used to understand the effectiveness of students' learning before and after interventions. Since it was not compulsory to participate in the test, there were fewer students who completed the pre-test and post-test (n=11), so the nonparametric test was used as the statistical method. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test showed that the post-test score was statistically significantly higher than the pre-test score, Z = -2.2, p = .03. The results pointed out that the method of combining SGQ with e-Learning system helped college students to understand the role of osmosis and diffusion. The researchers also found that most students seemed to forget the complexity of concept in the process of SGQ (as could be seen from their question, they did not choose a simple concept), but instead considered whether they could use multiple concepts to make a complete work. The limitation of this study was that there are fewer participants. In addition, although the system provided an environment for students to generate more freely, whether it distracted them (pay more attention to the technical aspects of work rather than the scientific concepts behind it) was a topic worth exploring.

Keywords:

Osmosis and diffusion, Osmosis and Diffusion Conceptual Assessment (ODCA), student question-generation (SGQ), e-learning.